WARNING: PLOT SPOILERS! Alvin Purple uses the classic English sex comedy model of a hapless, clumsy idiot who becomes an inadvertent sex symbol, gigolo and porn star! For some bizarre reason his spindly frame and inoffensive demeanor he's irresistible to women - all he really wants is to herald in the `Sexless Seventies', and instead he finds a naked Jacki Weaver on his beanbag waiting for a `cup of sugar'. It's a case of `you've never had it so good, mate' - an assortment of crackers, nymphos and `top sorts' can't seem to get enough of Purple. His problem starts in high school, persued by a flock of screaming teeny girls on bikes, when he's taken in and `comforted' by his teacher's wife. An absolute dill at everything he tries, he goes from one deadend job to another (in a classic nude bodypainting scene, Alvin smears purple paint on his - erm - paintbrush.as a waterbed salesman he ends up in bed with a customer and spears the bed with his spikes). He goes to a psychiatrist to cure him of his rampant libido, who recommends him to the mysterious Dr McBurney (George Whaley), a charlatan who rents out Alvin as a bogus sex therapist to bored housewives and slips them the old `Purple Method'. Naturally the whole sordid business is exposed, and Alvin winds up in court in front of a crusty porn-obsessed Judge (Noel Ferrier).
Love it (like I do) or hate it, Alvin Purple is a knowing satire on 70s sex and the Permissive Society - at one point Alvin stops outside a Melbourne cinema showing Bedroom Mazurka, a saucy sex comedy from Scandinavia which enjoyed its own series! Seventies sex symbol Abigail (Number 96 and countless Page Three cheesecake appearances) makes a brief appearance in the first scene on a tram; the super-suave Purple imagines a sophisticated dialogue with Abigail about the properties of her breasts, and instead blurts out `Gee you've got nice tits.' Slap, cue poor schmuck Alvin wanting to herald the `Sexless Seventies'. The film ends on a strangely but expected conservative streak: Alvin falls in love with the one girl who doesn't throw herself at him, she becomes a nun rather than face Alvin's reluctant libido, and he ends up a gardener in the convent's gardens surrounded by women who have no interest in him!
Alvin Purple was Australia's first real sex film, and despite (or because of) a phenomenal domestic box office and even a TV special on the making of the movie, it is usually written off by the cultural elite. In the Noughties the film is enjoying somewhat of a reappraisal, usually from the same cultural archaeologists who have just discovered the wonders of the Barry Mackenzie series. Despite its `sex film' tag it had and still has a legitimacy thanks to Burstall's quirky direction, Brian Cadd's hit film score, an assured supporting cast loaded with familiar TV and film faces, and the endearing acting by Blundell. Of course its timing - the `Permissive Society' and the R rating were in full swing - was perfect.
Love it (like I do) or hate it, Alvin Purple is a knowing satire on 70s sex and the Permissive Society - at one point Alvin stops outside a Melbourne cinema showing Bedroom Mazurka, a saucy sex comedy from Scandinavia which enjoyed its own series! Seventies sex symbol Abigail (Number 96 and countless Page Three cheesecake appearances) makes a brief appearance in the first scene on a tram; the super-suave Purple imagines a sophisticated dialogue with Abigail about the properties of her breasts, and instead blurts out `Gee you've got nice tits.' Slap, cue poor schmuck Alvin wanting to herald the `Sexless Seventies'. The film ends on a strangely but expected conservative streak: Alvin falls in love with the one girl who doesn't throw herself at him, she becomes a nun rather than face Alvin's reluctant libido, and he ends up a gardener in the convent's gardens surrounded by women who have no interest in him!
Alvin Purple was Australia's first real sex film, and despite (or because of) a phenomenal domestic box office and even a TV special on the making of the movie, it is usually written off by the cultural elite. In the Noughties the film is enjoying somewhat of a reappraisal, usually from the same cultural archaeologists who have just discovered the wonders of the Barry Mackenzie series. Despite its `sex film' tag it had and still has a legitimacy thanks to Burstall's quirky direction, Brian Cadd's hit film score, an assured supporting cast loaded with familiar TV and film faces, and the endearing acting by Blundell. Of course its timing - the `Permissive Society' and the R rating were in full swing - was perfect.